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Presentation as indirection, indirection as schooling: The two aspects of Benjamin’s scholastic method

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Abstract

Why does Walter Benjamin claim “indirection” (Umweg) to be the proper method for philosophical contemplation and writing? Why is this method—embodied, according to Benjamin, in the convoluted form of scholastic treatises and in their use of citations—fundamental for understanding his Origin of German Trauerspiel as suggesting an alternative to most strands of modern philosophy? The explicit and well-studied function of this method is for the presentation of what cannot be represented in language, of what cannot be intended or approached in thinking. Namely, of what Benjamin understands as “truth.” Indeed, as Adorno implied, providing a method for presenting an intentionless reality, rather than for re-presenting the world as corresponding to the mind, is revolutionary. However, I claim that beyond its presentational function, the method of indirection has a further, pedagogical function. Benjamin’s concept of truth requires thinking in a manner that does not impose any exterior form, any conceptual or intuitive intention on truth and the materials in which it might be exhibited. The methodological adoption of digressive and intermittent writing is supposed to transform the way we think, or more accurately, the position (Haltung) from which thinking occurs. By examining Benjamin’s use of pedagogical terms against the backdrop of scholastic history and the Urfigure of modern method, that of Descartes, I show that writing and reading in the form of the tractatus serves as exercise in receding from the subject-position—a position of a subject intending an object—and thus conditions the presentation of intentionless truth.

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Notes

  1. Benjamin (2017, #1). I am citing from a manuscript of a new, forthcoming translation of Ursprung des deutschen Trauerspiels by Howard Eiland and Michael Jennings, titled Origin of German Trauerspiel (henceforth Origin). As this manuscript is in preparation, I refer to the section numbers in the Foreword, which Michael Jennings has kindly allowed me to cite. When referring to the body of the book, I will refer to the former translation by Osborne (Benjamin 1977). It is worth noting that following this former translation of the text, the literature commonly refers to Umweg as “digression”—a term that misses the connotation of detour, which is maintained in the new translation.

  2. Ferris (2006, p. 3) criticizes the limitations of this kind of reading. A classic example for this literary reading of Benjamin’s method is Steiner (1977, p. 21), who, in his introduction to Origin, views digression (indirection) as representing “the highly self-conscious idiom and argumentative proceeding” that a “reflective re-enactment” of the perception of the German baroque drama demands. For a more recent example of such a reading, which, albeit making a brief reference to the opposition between Benjamin’s method and a modern philosophical orientation, still focuses on Benjamin’s idiosyncratic practices of writing, see Kleinwort (2011).

  3. Adorno (1977).

  4. The two forefathers of Benjamin exegesis, Scholem and Adorno, both considered their friend’s work as metaphysics, in spite of their differences. However, from the 1970’s this work was more often read as literary and cultural criticism rather than as part of the philosophical tradition. Prominent recent examples of the latter are: Fenves (2011), Friedlander (2012), Benjamin (2013). Among several earlier examples, it is especially significant to note in the current context the work of Caygill (1998), which situates Benjamin in relation to Kant, since it explains the philosophical grounds of Benjamin’s later turn to cultural history, and thus enables us to understand the common tendency to not reading him as a philosopher. Whether this turn should be understood as “philosophizing beyond philosophy” (Caygill), or as part of “a philosophical project” (Friedlander), the significance of situating Benjamin in the philosophical tradition remains.

  5. Friedlander (2012, p. 12).

  6. See ibid. (pp. 9–36) and also Frey (1996).

  7. As I indicate below, in Caygill (1998) and Ferris (2006) I find inspiration for my own reading. .

  8. Benjamin (2017, #16).

  9. Benjamin will further develop the term in his later writings on Brecht. On this later development of Haltung see Nägele (2006).

  10. Caygill (1998, p. 57) stresses the transformative power of the method, however, he disregards the scholastic tractatus as a practice of writing. This point is nicely attended by Ferris’ (2006), who highlights the effect induced by the form of the text on the reader’s form of contemplation. By emphasizing the historical context of the tractatus and Benjamin’s pedagogical terms, my reading allows understanding the transformation both authors connect to the method as the result of a pedagogical process.

  11. Fenves (2011, p. 171).

  12. Benjamin (2017, #6).

  13. Ferber (2013, pp. 164-189), and see also Weber (2008, p. 348).

  14. Oxford Dictionaries (2016).

  15. Derrida (1983, p. 36), my translation.

  16. Benjamin (2017, #2).

  17. Ibid.

  18. Ibid. #6.

  19. Ibid. #2.

  20. Ibid. #1.

  21. Ibid. #2.

  22. Ibid. #6.

  23. Ibid. #6.

  24. Ferber (2013, pp. 45–54).

  25. For an elaborate discussion of presentation and its relation to Benjamin’s theory of language, see Frey (1996).

  26. Benjamin (2017, #1).

  27. For a discussion of this concept see Fenves (2011, p. 43), Friedlander (2012, pp. 27–36) Weber (2008, pp. 312) and Benjamin (1996a).

  28. Benjamin (2017, #1).

  29. Ibid.

  30. Ibid.

  31. Leinsle (2010, pp. 55–56); Endres (1889, pp. 52–59); Grabmann (1957).

  32. Schwartz (1999, pp. 74–75; 124–125).

  33. Makdisi (1981) shows that this is true not only to European universities but also to Islamic madrasas prior to their foundation.

  34. Panofsky (1951, p. 33).

  35. Kenny and Pinborg (1982, p. 26). Benjamin thought of writing his Habilitationsschrift on the relation of word and concept in the works of Duns Scotus, but abandoned the project, presumably after reading Martin Heidegger’s Habilitationsschrift on the topic. Eiland and Jennings (2014, pp. 117–118).

  36. Benjamin (2003, p. 305).

  37. Aquinas (1952, sections 1.1–1.3).

  38. Friedlander (2012, p. 11).

  39. Wittgenstein (2013).

  40. Benjamin (1977, p. 62).

  41. Ibid., p. 65.

  42. Significantly, in “One-Way Street”, published at the same year as Origin, Benjamin (1996b, p. 462) notes that the medieval treatise abolishes the distinction between “thematic and excursive expositions”. For more on the tractatic connection between “One-Way Street” and Origin see Jennings (2016, pp. 4–6).

  43. See Ferris (2006) and Frey (1996) for excellent discussions of this comparison.

  44. Benjamin (2017, #1).

  45. Eli Friedlander (2012, p. 12). A similar argument is found in Frey (1996).

  46. Even though it does not refer directly to the treatise, Adorno’s implicit reference to Benjamin’s method as “trial combinations” could be interpreted similarly, as an exercise in finding the combination of phenomena pulled out of context that would have a striking revelatory power. (Adorno 1977, p. 127).

  47. Benjamin (2017, #1, my italics).

  48. Adorno (1977, p. 126).

  49. Benjamin (2017, #16).

  50. Ibid.

  51. Ibid. #1.

  52. Ibid. #16.

  53. Ibid.

  54. Ibid. #5.

  55. Ibid. #16.

  56. See Nägele (2006) on the relation between Schmitt’s influence on Benjamin’s concept of sovereignty and his theoretical orientation towards the extreme.

  57. Duden Online (2016).

  58. Deutsches Wörterbuch von Jacob Grimm und Wilhelm Grimm (1998–2016).

  59. Benjamin (2017, #6).

  60. Ibid. #11.

  61. Ibid. #16.

  62. Benjamin (1977, pp. 175–182).

  63. Benjamin (1996a).

  64. Benjamin (2017, #1).

  65. Ibid. #2.

  66. For an elaboration of how Benjamin challenges Neo-Kantianism, and especially the Marburg school, see Fenves (2011).

  67. While referring to Origin merely in a footnote, Adorno’s (1977) inaugural lecture provides a map of more or less the entire German-speaking philosophical world in the late 1920’s (Neo-Kantianism, Phenomenology, Logical Positivism, etc.) as opposed to Benjamin’s presentation of “intentionless reality”.

  68. Benjamin (2017, #1).

  69. Benjamin hardly refers to Descartes in his corpus. Apart from the implicit references in Origin stated above, he also refers very briefly to Cartesian dualism as Baroque. However, the sharp opposition to Descartes’ spatial figure of method opens up the possibility to further the understanding of his critique against Neo-Kantianism, which in earlier phases Benjamin (1991) thought about through spatial tropes.

  70. Descartes (1985, pp. 111–112).

  71. Ibid.

  72. It is interesting to note that the first step in finding the first item of certain knowledge, the cogito, which also provides the standard for certainty, is different, of course. This can be seen by the use of the metaphor of foundation, which stresses the qualitative difference between it and later cognitions. Furthermore, it might be thought as a deviation from former habits referred to in the Discourse.

  73. Descartes (1985, p. 119).

  74. Ibid. p. 116.

  75. On the performative theatrical dimensions of presentation see Nägele (1991).

  76. Benjamin (2017, #1).

  77. I am alluding to (Cadava et al. 1991).

  78. Cited and adapted in Nägele (2006, p. 168) from Benjamin (1999, p. 208).

  79. A significant philosophical understanding of these practices is provided by Caygill (1998, pp. 117–148).

  80. Benjamin, (1999, p. 603). A recent discussion of this rule provides an example of how the philosophical resonances of Benjamin’s thought are too often disregarded. See Jarosinski (1999).

  81. I am alluding here to what Pierre Hadot (1995, p. 83) referred to as “spiritual exercise” in his study of various moments in the history of philosophy from antiquity up to post-modernity. Unlike Hadot, however, Benjamin aims not at raising the individual from an inauthentic to an authentic state, but rather at extracting the self from contemplation.

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Acknowledgements

I wish to thank Naveh Frumer, Michael Jennings and the participants of the “Allegory as a Way of Life” workshop in the Minerva Center for the Humanities in Tel Aviv University for their insightful comments on former versions of this paper. I also thank the Minerva Stiftung Gesellschaft für die Forschung m.b.H. and the Minerva Humanities Center at Tel Aviv University for supporting the work on this article.

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    Ori Rotlevy

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Rotlevy, O. Presentation as indirection, indirection as schooling: The two aspects of Benjamin’s scholastic method. Cont Philos Rev 50, 493–516 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11007-016-9404-2

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